Integral Theory

Ken Wilber is a contemporary theorist who has developed a new way of looking at systems. Every system, such as human systems… or in my example products … can be looked at in terms of four quadrants, or dimensions. These four quadrants are based on a cross section derived from two axis: the Individual and the Collective, and the Interior and the Exterior. Thus, the four quadrants are:

• Individual Interior
• Individual Exterior
• Collective Interior
• Collective Exterior

Application to Products

Applying this to products, the Individual in question is the product. The Collective are the community of consumers and providers of the product.  Thus, we can discuss the product as having quadrants or dimensions:

• The Product Interior  – the materials the architecture, the code itself, the platform.
• The Product Exterior – the outer view of the product extending from interfaces to the final packaging.
• The Collective Interior – the personal experiences with the product by its developers and users.
• The Collective Exterior – the collective experience with the product’s supporting and surrounding systems.

Product Management

Effective product management clearly requires attention to all four quadrants.  Have you known product managers that spend too much time on managing the packaging and marketing, and  not enough on the internal integrity of the product? Or, vice versa?   Excluding attention on any one of the quadrants can lead to failure. And looking at a product decision’s impact in all four quadrants can lead to success.

Integral Quadrants

• The Product Interior – is the product internally consistent? Does it have an architecture that works at the logic, module, and macro levels? Does it have integrity and is it trustworthy?

• The Product Exterior – are the interfaces consistent and in alignment with the function? For example, you would not put a “fun” interface on an enterprise software, nor would you but a green-screen data interface on a piece of consumer software. The product’s “exteriors” must provide be in alignment and consistent with the product purpose or function.

• The Collective Interior – The individual’s experience with the product. Remember that this includes the consumers as well as the producers. If the producers can’t stand to work on the product, that is a collective “we” failure.

• The Collective Exterior – The collective experience  both in term of it’s functional fit for use, and experience with the supporting and surrounding systems to the software, such as help desks or social networks. This is also the quadrant were we look at how “green” a product is as well.

More later… let me know what you think…

-B